Fans of aggressive metal with melodic influences, look out for Assailant, this might be an interesting band. `Nemesis Within` is the debut album of this Swedish band. They step into the path of the uncountable number of great bands from this northern part of Europe like Naglar, Norturnal Rites and Pursuader.

Guitar player Oscar Norberg comes from a very talented guitar-family, his brother Emil Norberg is lead guitar player at Persuader, his other brother Nils is lead guitar player of Norturnal Rites. Both appear as guests on Nemesis Within.
The cover of Nemesis Within reminds me of Samara Morgon of the movie The Ring. This horror movie has some very scary moments (I guess some of you don’t agree, but I really think so), so is the atmosphere of Nemesis Within mainly caused by the brutal and emotional voices on this album (listen to `Until the End and Shattered`).
The album opens with the song `Lies`, it’s intro is a very sweet sound of a musical box, after a few seconds the heavy and speedy riffs of Assaillant blow out of your speakers.

Vocalist Peder Sundqvist completes the heavy songs with his brutal type voice.
The fast songs have tiny moments when the double bass drums slow down, a moment to take a deep breathe to prepare yourself for the next heavy part. The melodic part is the opposite of the voices of Sundqvist, it must be said Assaillant knows how to write aggressive songs that still are melodic. Sometimes they overdo this contradiction, like on `Edge of Forever`, when you can hear the Final Countdown tune of Europe: I don’t like this much, the tune doesn’t fit with the rest of the Assaillant material.

Favourite songs are `Mental State` (very aggressive and with a great solo), `Shattered` (very emotional) and `Tomorrow` (great power ballad). Conclusion: again a great Swedish band with a strong debut-album.